Post by: fallen on October 12, 2003, 07:08:00 AM
Basically I am trying to get XBox A and XBox B to talk to eachother in system link games such as Halo over the LAN. The problem is that XBox B is the otherside of a wireless connection, and the only link to the main LAN is via a wireless PCI card in the PC there. I figured I had 2 obvious choices, to either get another AP and hub switch to bridge the 2 LANs, or install another NIC in the PC and connect it to XBox B via a X-Over cable. I vouched for the latter basically because I already have the hardware, and no money to buy another AP and hub
In theory this should work, but my main problem is configuring the Win2K PC connected to XBox B so that it passes the connection to the LAN on the otherside of the wireless link, whilst keeping XBox B on the same subnet/IP range as XBox A. Sofar I have tried setting up an IP bridge between the NIC and the wireless card using this software: http://www.ntkernel....herbridge.shtml which apparently installed and ran fine with no errors, but alas didn't work. I also tried using Win2K connection sharing on the wireless card, but of course this put XBox B on a different subnet/IP range. As a last ditch attempt I tried switching on IP forwarding in the Win2K registry, but that did squat all also. Has anyone got any other suggestions, or know of some handy windows software which will do this for me? Just for the record only XBox A is modded to run other software.
Post by: fallen on October 12, 2003, 12:10:00 PM
everything has a static ip, though there is a dhcp server running on the router for anything that should connect without a static address. all the pcs/macs and xbox A all talk to each other fine - the pc the otherside of the wireless just sees the connection as another nic so as far as its concerned it's connected directly to the hub. the only problem is xbox B because i dont have the hardware to establish a direct connection, which is why im trying to get it to 'pass through' the pc with the wireless nic installed. atm it wont see anything else on the network except the pc that it's connected to, and wont even get an ip address from the dhcp because the pc isn't currently passing it on. i'm led to believe i need to create an ip 'bridge' between the 2 nics installed on the wireless pc, and that winxp supports this natively, but unfortunately i only have win2k. if you can figure this out it would be much appretiated!
thanks for your help
Post by: MorfiusX on October 12, 2003, 12:16:00 PM
You can create a static adress on any device on the network and still connect to the internet. You just need to have the default gateway set as the IP of the router. So on the PC connected to Xbox B and Xbox B, set the default gateway as the gateway of the router. Assign them static IPs if you want. They don't have to get IP's from the router. Then bridge the connection.
Also, if you conifgure the IPs statically, you will probably have to set the primary DNS server to the IP of the router as well so it can forward DNS queries to the internet.
Post by: mrRobinson on October 12, 2003, 01:31:00 PM
Post by: Rohaq on October 12, 2003, 03:20:00 PM
| QUOTE (MorfiusX @ Oct 12 2003, 09:16 PM) |
| On the PC that Xbox B is connected to: Windows Xp comes with the option to bridge 2 network connections. I'm pretty sure Win2K does as well. This reminds me to much of the questions on the MCSE exams... |
Yep, I did this: I've got two NICs, connected one two my router/modem combo, and another to my Xbox. I went into Network connections and highlgihted the two NICs, right-clicked and chose to bridge them. Worked well too. My Xbox was automatically assigned an IP and could access Live with no problems.
Post by: MorfiusX on October 12, 2003, 03:55:00 PM
| QUOTE (mrRobinson @ Oct 12 2003, 04:31 PM) |
| The keyword you want to look up is ICS (Internet connection sharing). You just need to setup internet connection sharing on the pc connected to xbox B then that xbox will communicate with the rest of your network fine. |
If you set it up this way, and he's using a non 192.168 subnet, then Xbox B will be on a different subnet. Also, Xbox A will not be able to see Xbox B.
Post by: mrRobinson on October 12, 2003, 04:47:00 PM
Post by: fallen on October 13, 2003, 02:55:00 AM
i think now bridging is definately the way to go, but as XBox B and associated PC aren't actually in my house i haven't had a chance to try it yet i can't find anything which says win2k supports bridging which is the only thing that worries me, i'd hate to have to buy XP just to play system link games... oh and for those of you interested my IP range is on 192.168.1.x which i don't think is a particularly unsusal range to use. will let you all know if i get it working tonight
Post by: Rohaq on October 13, 2003, 05:02:00 AM
Post by: fallen on October 13, 2003, 12:39:00 PM
| QUOTE (Rohaq @ Oct 13 2003, 02:02 PM) |
| Awaiting your reply |
well here it is -
I took the plunge and decided to make the upgrade to XP. I installed it as an upgrade from win2k rather than a reformat, always dodgy I know, but it isn't my computer so I didn't get a choice. Everything seemed to install fine, and as a standalone connection, the wireless still worked fine, the way it always had done. The caveat comes though when I build the bridge I get a BSOD around 30 seconds later :S This of course doesn't even give me a chance to configure the bridge, and I literally have a race after rebooting to delete the bridge before it BSODs again. I've installed all sorts of updates, though none of them netsh specific, updated all the NIC drivers etc etc and tried a force compatabilty mode using the command line as suggested in a MS bridging related article. So I'm pretty much stumped as to the next step - I have a feeling it may be related to the bridging drivers I installed under win2k from the link in my original post, so short of a complete reformat I don't really know how do uninstall/reinstall the netsh driver. All I can do now is go play Halo and see if a solution magically comes to me...
Post by: mrRobinson on October 13, 2003, 12:42:00 PM
Post by: MorfiusX on October 13, 2003, 12:44:00 PM
| QUOTE (fallen @ Oct 13 2003, 03:39 PM) | ||
well here it is - I took the plunge and decided to make the upgrade to XP. I installed it as an upgrade from win2k rather than a reformat, always dodgy I know, but it isn't my computer so I didn't get a choice. Everything seemed to install fine, and as a standalone connection, the wireless still worked fine, the way it always had done. The caveat comes though when I build the bridge I get a BSOD around 30 seconds later :S This of course doesn't even give me a chance to configure the bridge, and I literally have a race after rebooting to delete the bridge before it BSODs again. I've installed all sorts of updates, though none of them netsh specific, updated all the NIC drivers etc etc and tried a force compatabilty mode using the command line as suggested in a MS bridging related article. So I'm pretty much stumped as to the next step - I have a feeling it may be related to the bridging drivers I installed under win2k from the link in my original post, so short of a complete reformat I don't really know how do uninstall/reinstall the netsh driver. All I can do now is go play Halo and see if a solution magically comes to me... |
I know it's a pain, but it's now time for you to reformat. The PC will run better in the long run.
Post by: fallen on October 13, 2003, 12:54:00 PM
| QUOTE (mrRobinson @ Oct 13 2003, 09:42 PM) |
| what displays when you blue screen? does it give you a driver or code? set it so when it blue screens it writes to a log and look in there for clues to what is causing it. |
beginning phsical memory dump....
Load of hex garbage
If this is the first time you've seen this restart your computer. If this is the second time or more try removing or uninstalling any recently added hardware or software
though that's just from memory. Unfortunately I'm home again and I won't get to tinker with it again for another 20 hours. I suppose that's 20 hours to work on persuading a reformat
Post by: viewwin on October 14, 2003, 02:46:00 PM
Post by: MorfiusX on October 14, 2003, 02:57:00 PM
| QUOTE (fallen @ Oct 13 2003, 03:54 PM) | ||
beginning phsical memory dump.... Load of hex garbage If this is the first time you've seen this restart your computer. If this is the second time or more try removing or uninstalling any recently added hardware or software though that's just from memory. Unfortunately I'm home again and I won't get to tinker with it again for another 20 hours. I suppose that's 20 hours to work on persuading a reformat |
Well, here's my opinion. Windows runs 10,000% better when clean installed. That's just the nature of the beast. You could look through the event log to see when the critical error occured. But, this may or may not give you usable info. Where I work, when we get even the first blue screen, we reformat the pc and reinstall everything. We spend more time troubleshooting what is causing the error and fixing that one particular error than we do just starting from scratch. Also, M$ recommends that any OS be reinstalled every 6 months. I do mine about every 3.
Post by: viewwin on October 14, 2003, 03:25:00 PM
Xbox1 on router, xbox2 on wired pc(bridged nic cards)-->works fine
xbox1 on wireless bridge(d-link 810+) to router, xbox2 on wired pc(bridged nic cards)-->works fine
xbox1 on router, xbox2 on wireless pc(bridged nic cards)-->does not work
xbox1 on wireless bridge(d-link 810+), xbox2 on wireless pc(bridged nic cards)-->does not work
I guess that an xbox on a pc that is wireless cannot communicate with other xboxs. I had this problem with xbconnect when i tried to run it off the wireless computer and it did not see my xbox either. Does anyone have any ideal what is causing the problems?
Post by: MorfiusX on October 14, 2003, 05:29:00 PM
Post by: MorfiusX on October 14, 2003, 05:30:00 PM
| QUOTE (viewwin @ Oct 14 2003, 06:25 PM) |
| I have tried several different layouts: Xbox1 on router, xbox2 on wired pc(bridged nic cards)-->works fine xbox1 on wireless bridge(d-link 810+) to router, xbox2 on wired pc(bridged nic cards)-->works fine xbox1 on router, xbox2 on wireless pc(bridged nic cards)-->does not work xbox1 on wireless bridge(d-link 810+), xbox2 on wireless pc(bridged nic cards)-->does not work I guess that an xbox on a pc that is wireless cannot communicate with other xboxs. I had this problem with xbconnect when i tried to run it off the wireless computer and it did not see my xbox either. Does anyone have any ideal what is causing the problems? |
Well from this info, the source of the problem lies some where in the wireless network.
One thing I need to ask is can you ping all Xboxs? Even when it's setup but not working.
Post by: viewwin on October 14, 2003, 08:40:00 PM
Post by: Rohaq on October 15, 2003, 11:00:00 AM
| QUOTE (viewwin @ Oct 15 2003, 05:40 AM) |
| Well, i am able to ping my xbox which is behind the pc on the wireless lan from another computer on the network. But as soon as i start a game like halo, i can no longer ping it. Is this normal? |
Normal, methinks. When you're in EvoX, your Xbox has the software requirements to respond to a ping request. As soon as other software is run, like Halo, all other software (such as the EvoX dash) is unloaded, and you'll get no replies to pings.
| QUOTE |
| I can access the xbox while on the evox dashboard and ping it then. But once in games, i can no longer ping either xbox. This applies to having my connections bridged on my computer. When they are on ics, sometimes i can't even access my xbox from other computers, only when the connection is bridged. |
Bridging connections is like bringing two halves of a network together into one, a bit like a bridge across water, strangely
When the bridge isn't there, the two halves can no longer reach each other, and so you won't get any communication between computers on different sides of the network.| QUOTE |
| But like i said, it works fine when the computer and xbox are both on wired lan, just because i run my pc off a wireless card, the xbox will not connect to another xbox, but i know that it does have internet access because i can connect to xbox live from the bridged connection(with wireless) with no problem. |
Here's where I become a little confused. Are you trying to connect an Xbox straight into a normal wireless adaptor? This won't work, because the Xbox's puny operating system has no drivers for wireless networking. even the recently released wireless adaptor only converts wireless signals into ethernet language (I think). The Xbox may have wireless options, but they probably only communicate with the wireless adapter via the ethernet connection.
Another tip is that network bridging apparently doesn't work on connections that are being shared using the Windows ICS.
If you want more help, try drawing your network layout in Paint or something, so we can get a better idea of what your network looks like.
Post by: viewwin on October 15, 2003, 11:56:00 AM
| QUOTE (Rohaq @ Oct 15 2003, 08:00 PM) | ||||||||||||||||
| Bridging connections is like bringing two halves of a network together into one, a bit like a bridge across water, strangely When the bridge isn't there, the two halves can no longer reach each other, and so you won't get any communication between computers on different sides of the network. Post by: Rohaq on October 15, 2003, 02:00:00 PM
Upload it to some webspace, then use the following:
...and your image will be posted.
I'm guessing that your network looks something like this then:  In which case you cannot bridge a connection that is shared using ICS. Technically you should be able to bridge the connections on the wired computer, and your Xbox will be able to access the net via the router. Justm ake sure that you disable all of the ICS features on your wireless PC. This worked on my network, although I only use wires, and my Xbox could access Live through my router/modem combo with no problems. I haven't got my modchip (just ordered an Xbit from Whitedog, just gotta wait now ) so I can't comment on ftp capabilities in EvoX, but I'm guessing it should work, since the Xbox is just another IP on the network. One possiblity is that you've got the IP wrong, since your automatically assigned Xbox IP will change between when your network connections are bridged and when they are not.
Post by: MorfiusX on October 15, 2003, 02:51:00 PM You said that you could connect to EvoX? Set up the bridge. Statically assign an IP to the Xbox and fill in the values that the router once assigned. Then try it. The deal with ICS is that it kinda acts like a firewall or proxy. You can set it to forward packet requests to a certian IP. This is done in the ICS advanced properties. ICS uses a scaled down form of NAT to translate your private address to a public one. Although your "public" address is another private address. Post by: Rohaq on October 15, 2003, 02:59:00 PM
You can't bridge a connection shared by ICS. If he's using a router, he shouldn't even need ICS. Here's a stupid question: Is your PC with the bridged connections on when you try to connect to Live? XP can't bridge connections if your PC ain't switched on, strangely
Post by: MorfiusX on October 15, 2003, 03:44:00 PM
I didn't say to use ICS and a bridge. I was just giving info on how ICS works. Post by: Rohaq on October 15, 2003, 04:07:00 PM
Gotchya You forgot to mention that ICS also functions as a DHCP server, assigning IPs, so it'll cock up royally if you're using a router, as their DHCP servers clash. Still, ICS shouldn't even be mentioned here; AFAIK, he doesn't need it if he's using a router, as long as his router is connected straight into his DSL connection. Post by: viewwin on October 15, 2003, 09:38:00 PM
Yeah, i know that i can bridge a wired connection and xboxes will play system linked games, xbox live, or ftp files. When i place an xbox bridged with a pc with wireless lan, the xbox still does xbox live, ftp from any computer on the lan, but the xboxes will not play system linked games. It is like they do not see each other. I have tried two different brands of wireless cards with the same results. Post by: viewwin on October 15, 2003, 09:47:00 PM Post by: Rohaq on October 16, 2003, 11:06:00 AM Post by: viewwin on October 16, 2003, 01:42:00 PM Post by: Rohaq on October 16, 2003, 02:15:00 PM Simple question, but I take it one is hosting, and the other is definitely looking for system link games then? Post by: viewwin on October 16, 2003, 05:03:00 PM |